A/N: Thank you all for your patience in my getting this chapter out and about. My poor beta has been sick with bronchitis and wasn't able to get me the chapter last week. Hopefully, you can forgive us.

Anyway, a huge thanks to all of you for reading/reviewing. I love hearing your thoughts on the chapters.

...B...

Some people was all I could think of as I listened to this bitch run her mouth. I barely had to ask her anything about the Volterra Corporation or her husband because she was willing to tell me anything and everything especially once her husband left to take a phone call.

"So he collects coins?" I asked after she'd mentioned that he had a room dedicated to antiques and coins.

"Oh, yeah," she said with a slightly bored tone to her voice. "I don't understand the appeal of collecting them, but whatever."

"Yeah, I don't get it either," I agreed which was partially true. I didn't quite get the appeal of coins or snuff boxes but to each their own.

Thinking that she'd found an ally in me, she began to really talk about how much it drove her crazy. I looked over her shoulder at Edward, rolling my eyes slightly, and he smirked before pointing toward the hallway that housed the bathrooms. I gave him a nod and watched as he walked away before turning my attention back to the vapid blonde in front of me.

"The man has become obsessed with some stupid coin that he just has to have," she said, her voice filled with disgust.

"What kind of coin?" I asked her, and this time, my interest in what she had to say was genuine.

"Some kind of hair dollar. The stupid thing costs a shit ton of money that I'd much prefer be spent on me. I mean, really? Who spends millions of dollars on a fucking coin? Now, I can understand spending millions on clothes or a house, but a coin? It's ridiculous."

I thought she was ridiculous. I couldn't imagine spending millions of dollars on clothes, but then again, I didn't have a million dollars and probably never would.

"Maybe you could ask Edward to look around for the coin?" she suggested. "I'd ask himself, but I'm pretty sure he's still heartbroken over our break-up."

I stared at her with an incredulous look on my face. What about my man screamed that he was still torn up over her?

"Sure, I can do that," I told her although there was no need since her husband's crony had already done that.

"Are you sure your husband hasn't asked Edward already?"

She looked startled by my question.

"Why would he? He doesn't know who Edward is or what he does."

I debated on whether or not to bring up Demitri Voltaire and the fact that he'd been asking Edward about the coin, but I was distracted by Edward coming back from the bathroom.

He was halfway to me when a man stepped in front of him and blocked my view. From this far away, I couldn't see who it was, but something about his body language set off alarms in my head.

Excusing myself from the self-absorbed Tanya, I made my way toward Edward and noticed that the man in front of him had a firm grip on Edward's arm.

"Is there a problem, gentlemen?" I asked in a quiet voice, and the man who was holding onto Edward let go.

"Certo che, no!" the man said in what I assumed was Italian.

"Excuse me, Edward. Your dad wants to speak with you," I lied, taking his hand and beginning to walk away from the man.

"Stronza ficcanaso!" he spat, and I had a feeling I'd just been insulted.

"Who was that?" I asked Edward, and he shook his head as he told me he'd never met the man before.

"He wanted to know what information I had about the Flowing Hair dollar," he explained to me as he rubbed a hand over his arm where the man had gripped it.

"I don't fucking get this," I hissed in a low voice. "Caius has a shit ton of money. Why not just buy this coin outright on eBay or some auction site?"

"Because the one he wants isn't listed on eBay. He wants the 1794 Flowing Hair silver dollar, and it was sold at auction in 2013. There aren't any others just like that one."

"Well, if it's been sold, then how does he expect to get it?" I asked, and then shook my head at the stupidity of my question. The man had already proven that he was willing to do whatever it took to get his hands on the stupid thing.

"Last time I had a face to face with Volturi, he mentioned that the coin was up for sale by the man who paid ten million for it, but I can't confirm that through any of my sources," Edward told me.

"Shouldn't someone warn the original owner?" I suggested, and Edward nodded before saying that was a good idea.

"Okay," I told him. "I'll get Emmett on that as soon as we leave here."

By the time we got back to our table, Tanya was gone, so we spent the rest of the evening with Esme and Carlisle, eating and trying to enjoy ourselves.

We got back to the Cullen house a little after one in the morning, and I was exhausted.

I quickly changed out of the dress and put on a pair of sleep shorts and a tank top before heading into the bathroom to wipe off the makeup that I'd worn.

When I came out of the bathroom, I found Edward sprawled face down on his bed in only a pair of dark green boxer briefs, and I took a minute to just stare at him.

"Are you going to stand there staring, or are you coming to bed?" he asked, and I grinned at him as I made my way to the bed.

"I was just enjoying the view," I told him.

"You can enjoy more than the view," he said with a silly grin, and I rolled my eyes at him, but I really did want to enjoy more than the view.

Our clothes came off before we climbed under the covers, and we both let out quiet moans as Edward slid into me.

We made love in a sensual, quiet dance, and I had to bite my lip from calling out his name as I came.

Leaning down, Edward placed a kiss above my heart, which was still racing, before murmuring something that I couldn't hear.

He lay there for a while, his head resting against my chest and my fingers stroking through his hair.

After placing one more kiss to my chest, he slid out of me and rolled over, pulling me to his side. I curled up next to him, tossing a leg over his thigh, before Mother Nature called, and I had to extract myself from him.

When I was done, I crawled back into his bed and nestled right up against him once more.

All too soon, our trip to Chicago was coming to an end.

We'd spent the following days after the gala, doing all the touristy stuff there was to do, and I'd loved every minute of it. I'd loved pretending the drama and crimes plaguing us didn't exist, but I knew we had to get back to reality.

His mom drove us to the airport where she wrapped us both up in big hugs and made us promise to be safe.

"Please be careful," she told me after letting me go from her hug. "It would kill Edward if anything happened to you."

"I'll be careful," I told her, "I promise."

By seven that evening, Edward and I arrived back in Port Angeles, and I found that I wasn't ready to let him go just yet. I asked him if he wanted to stay at my place to which he eagerly agreed, but he wanted to stop by and check on the shop.

He parked behind the store, and after turning off the alarm, a quick walkthrough showed the store was in order.

I wandered around the book section while Edward ran upstairs to drop off his suitcase and grab a set of clothes for the next day.

"Ready?" I asked when he came back down, and a few minutes later, we were pulling into the driveway of my tiny house.

It wasn't the first time that Edward had spent the night at my place, but it always left me with a strange feeling. I wasn't sure if it was because I was used to living alone or if it was because I was far more serious about Edward than I had been my previous boyfriends.

The following morning, we ate breakfast together, kissed each other goodbye, and then went our separate ways for the day, agreeing to meet up for lunch if we were both available.

I'd only been at my desk for a few minutes, scarfing down a stale muffin and drinking some disgusting coffee when Archie called me.

"You need to see this," he said, and I jumped up from my desk, knocking my coffee over but not really caring. Tossing some old fast food napkins on my desk to mop on the spill, I ran down the stairs to his office.

"What did you find?" I asked him as I looked over his shoulder once we were at his desk.

"A money trail," he said, pointing at his screen where a bunch of bank account information was displayed, and I closed my eyes.

"Archie, we don't have a warrant for Denali's bank records, so I can't see this. It won't hold up in court," I told him.

"I wasn't actively looking for it. I just sort of stumbled across this info. That's all," he explained, but I shook my head.

"C'mon, Archie. I need something that will get me a warrant, but it has to be legal."

"Well, Denali flew to Italy a week before your boyfriend's antique shop was broken into."

"His daughter lives there part-time, so I'm not sure that will prove anything," I said, worrying my bottom lip with my teeth.

I felt like we were getting nowhere, so maybe we needed to start over from the beginning and look at what we knew.

"Ugh! Okay, let's focus on Demitri Voltaire for a moment. We know that he works for Aro Caius and that he approached Edward about some rare ten million dollar coin," I muttered, thinking out loud.

"He's also been arrested several times but never convicted," Archie chimed in, and I nodded my head.

"Okay, so we need to prove that Voltaire burglarized Edward's shop and that he was acting on Caius' orders."

Archie nodded his head in agreement.

"But, how the hell does Eleazar Denali fit into all this?" I asked.

"His son-in-law is Aro," Emmett said from behind us, "And chances are good he'd do anything for his daughter, but what I want to know is why Caius thinks Edward knows the whereabouts of a coin that isn't even up for sale and hasn't been reported stolen."

"Did you ever get ahold of the owner of the coin?" I asked, and Emmett shook his head.

"I left several messages for him, but he hasn't returned any of them which has me a bit concerned."

"Call the local law enforcement, and ask them to do a welfare check. Explain to them that Mr. Grover …"

"Watgrove," Emmett interjected.

"Fine, explain to them that Mr. Watgrove's life may be in danger."

"On it," he said with a nod before taking off.

"God, this is a clusterfuck," I muttered as I tugged at a lock of hair. I felt like we just weren't getting anywhere, and Emmett and I had other cases to worry about.

The captain had been good about letting us focus on Edward's case, but we had several other cases that were just as important, and I knew it was only a matter of time until Banner got on us for letting our other work slide.

"Tap into the CCTV's around town and in Seattle," I told Archie. " Look for Denali on those videos. We'll start there for now."

Archie nodded, and I made my way back upstairs to get some work done on a narcotics case that Emmett and I had caught last week.

We didn't have a vice unit, so drug cases fell to the detectives in our station, and we'd caught the last one.

Back at my desk, I dug through both the paper and electronic file we had on an Alec Jane. He was a small time drug dealer around Port Angeles, and he'd been busted alongside James Tracker handful of times.

His latest offense was selling meth to some high school kids which had resulted in the hospitalization of two of them. Alec had gone underground once word had spread that he'd sold them the drugs, and we were currently trying to find him.

It hadn't been going too well, and I have to admit, I had been more focused on Edward's case, so I needed to get my head on straight and not let other shit slide.

Unlike with Denali, we'd gotten a warrant for all of Alec's bank records as well as his for house, and as I scrolled through the information, I noticed that he'd made a transaction a few hours earlier in La Push.

I grabbed my cell phone and gave Jake a call to see if he'd spotted Alec around the reservation.

"Short, pale kid with dark hair and an attitude?" Jake asked me after I'd explained who I was looking for.

"That's him."

"I'm looking at him right now," Jake said. "He's on the beach with some of the local teens."

"Keep an eye on him, and if he starts to leave before I get there, arrest his ass," I told Jake.

Jake was a deputy with the La Push Police Department which was rather small.

"You got it," he told me, hanging up the phone, and I motioned to Emmett, who was on the phone, that I was leaving.

"Where you going?" he asked me, covering the mouthpiece on the phone.

"La Push. Jake's got eyes on Alec Jane."

"Go," Emmett said, and I grabbed my keys and bolted out of the station.

It took an hour and a half to get there, and just as I passed the sign welcoming me to La Push, my phone rang.

"I just got here," I told Jake. "I'm pulling up in front of the tribal jail now."

"Good, because this punk ass little brat is getting on my nerves," he growled into the phone, and I snorted out a laugh. Jake had zero tolerance for troublemakers which I found amusing because he used to be one. Oh, he hadn't done drugs or anything, but he sure had pushed the boundaries of the law.

But Jake also had zero tolerance for drug dealers. Hell, none of us had any tolerance for them, but drugs tended to run rampant on the reservation, especially meth, and Jake and his people were doing everything they could to keep it off tribal land, but they were fighting a losing battle.

Meth had become a major problem on several reservations throughout the state of Washington, and La Push was no exception. Not to mention that rape and aggravated assaults were rising on the reservation. Needless to say, the La Push Police Department kept busy.

I walked into the small jail and grinned when I saw Jake sitting behind a tiny desk, his large frame crammed into a chair. He looked like a giant sitting in a kindergarten chair.

"Asshat is back there," Jake said by way of greeting.

"I take it he's worn out his welcome?" I said with a grin, and Jake shot me a dirty look.

"Got it. I'll get him and then get out of your hair."

"Sounds good. Let's meet up this weekend. Dad's itching for a get together," he told me, and I eagerly agreed. Billy, Jake's dad, was a master at grilling fish which meant that my dad would most likely be up here early on Saturday morning to go fishing with Billy.

Walking to the back of the building, I grinned when I saw a disgruntled Alec pacing his small cell like a caged animal.

I approached the cell, informing him to turn his back to me as I unlocked the cell door with the key that Jake had given me. I wouldn't put it past Alec to try and do something stupid, like rushing me, and I was ready for anything.

Thankfully, he didn't put up a fight, but boy, he sure did run his mouth.

The whole ride back to Port Angeles had me fighting the urge to pull over and shut the kid up. He'd been advised of his rights, twice, and if he was smart, he would've shut his mouth. Then again, if he was smart, he wouldn't be selling drugs, so never mind. The kid was a moron who was giving me all kinds of information to use against him later.

"I gotta piss," he said when we were about twenty minutes away from the station.

"Too bad," I told him. I wasn't stupid enough to pull the car over and let him out.

"I gotta go real bad," he whined.

"Not my problem, and if you even think about pissing in the backseat, I'll tack on a charge of disorderly conduct," I told him, not that the charge would stick, but he didn't know that. "We'll be at the station in twenty minutes, so just hold it."

The rest of the ride to Port Angeles was spent listening to him whine about how his bladder was going to burst and how this was cruel and unusual punishment which had me rolling my eyes.

"You do realize that you've been arrested for selling meth, right? That's a Class B felony which means incarceration of up to ten years and fines upwards of twenty-five thousand dollars. I'd say, you have more things to worry about than whether or not I let you take a leak right now."

That shut him up, and the rest of the drive was spent in silence.

Once we arrived at the station, I took him to the interrogation room after he'd been allowed to use the bathroom and decided to let Emmett interrogate him.

"Got him?" Emmett asked after I sat back down at my desk and began filling out the paperwork that went along with the arrest.

"Yep, he's in interrogation room two. Feel free to scare the shit out of him," I told him, and a grin crossed Emmett's face.

It wasn't like we really needed a confession. Jake had busted Alec selling drugs, and the La Push police were to get a crack at Alec as well, but our charges came first.

After the long day I'd had, I was ready to call it quits by six-thirty, so I called Edward to see if he wanted to meet at the diner.

By six-forty-five, I was sliding into a booth and ordering iced tea for both Edward and myself, and I smiled when I saw him walk in.

He leaned down and gave me a quick kiss before sitting across the booth from me and picking up a menu.

After ordering our food, we talked about our day, and it felt like such a couple thing to do. While I knew we were a couple, it still seemed like so much more.

A little while later, Lucy arrived with our food, and we dug in. I was starving, and I scarfed down the unhealthy bacon cheeseburger and fries while Edward took his time eating the lasagna that he'd ordered.

We were almost done with dinner when I saw a dark colored sedan driving slowly past the window, and I caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of my eye that had me on edge. The car came to a stop as I was yelling for everyone to get down.

Seconds later, shots rang out in the air, and the only sounds to be heard were the breaking of glass, the screaming of people, and the rapid firing of a gun.

Crawling out from under the table, I took a quick look around and saw everyone hiding or crouching on the ground.

Edward was under our table as was Lucy, and I motioned for them to stay put.

Crouching, I made my way toward the front of the diner as quickly as I could while trying to stay covered.

Once at the door, I stood up and opened it before firing off a few shots. I took out the back window before the car began to take off, and I aimed for a tire, hoping to put the car out of commission, but I missed.

"Fuck!" I snarled as I watched it turn the corner at a high speed. I'd managed to catch a glimpse of the last two numbers on the plate, but that wasn't going to be much help. I'm sure there were thousands of dark blue or black sedans with the number six and two in their license plates.

Pulling my phone out of my pocket after holstering my gun, I called the station and told them there had been a shooting at the diner and to send backup as well as an ambulance. I'd seen some blood drops on the ground as I'd made way toward the door earlier.

Ending the call and sliding the phone back into my pocket, I went back inside the diner, asking if anyone was hurt.

A young man shouted out that one of the waitresses was hurt, and I stepped around the small crowd that was hovering around her and sighed with relief when I saw that she had been grazed on her upper arm and would only require some stitches. She'd definitely live despite her insistence that she was dying.

Moving away from her, I heard Lucy shouting my name frantically, and I rushed over toward where she was kneeling, and my heart about stopped.

Edward was on the floor, blood pouring from his shoulder as Lucy did her best to keep pressure on his wound.

I made my way next to Lucy, slipping a little bit on some spilled food on the floor before dropping to my knees next to her and Edward.

I wanted fall apart at seeing the man I loved lying on the floor with blood pooling around him, but I had to keep it together. For both of us.

Taking over for Lucy, I applied pressure to the wound all while telling Edward how sorry I was and how he was going to be okay.

"It's just a flesh wound, right?" he joked in a whisper, and I nodded my head although I feared it was worse than that. The brachial artery was located in the shoulder, and if the artery had been torn, he was going to bleed out quickly.

"I need you to talk to me," I told him, wanting him to stay awake and calm and hoping like hell that the ambulance would arrive soon. Although protocol stated that the police had to clear the scene first, I'd be damned if they weren't going to take Edward to the hospital first.

"I got the latest Blu-ray set of Doctor Who," he said in a quiet voice that shook a little bit. "We need to get you caught up."

I let out a small laugh.

"We can do that this weekend," I promised, hoping like hell it was a promise I could keep.

I kept him talking quietly about Doctor Who until the sound of sirens rang through the air, and I heaved a sigh of relief.

Emmett was the first cop in the door, and I called him over after he'd cleared the scene to make sure that no more gunmen were around.

"Jesus, Bella! What the hell happened?"

"I'll explain later. We need to get Edward to the hospital now!"

He nodded before gesturing for the paramedic to come in and then he made his way over to the other cops that had arrived. He told them to take witness statements before coming over to me.

They put Edward on a stretcher and wheeled him out to the ambulance, and I followed suit, only to be stopped by Emmett.

"I need to go with him!" I said in a frantic tone, but Emmett's words stopped me.

"You need medical attention, Bella. You're bleeding."

I stared at him for a moment, not quite understanding his words, and then I looked down at myself.

I was covered in blood, but I had just assumed it was Edward's, and I said as much.

"I need a medic over here!" Emmett hollered, and moments later, I was being looked over.

I was then strapped into a gurney and put in the second ambulance, fighting them the whole time.

I was fine, and I needed to be with Edward.

"Ma'am," one of the paramedics said, but I interrupted him.

"Detective Swan!" I snapped.

"Detective, you need to be still so that we can stop the bleeding," he told me in a patient voice, and I let out a sigh. I was being a bitch, and I knew he was just trying to do his job.

The paramedics pushed up the left side of my shirt, and I winced when I saw a small hole there. All the adrenaline from earlier was wearing off, and the pain and realization of being shot was starting to kick in.

I was rushed into the ER less than ten minutes later, and it was all a blur after that.

I fought to stay conscious, but the world began to darken, and I found myself truly scared.

a/n: If anyone speaks Italian, I apologize if Google translate messed it up.

The translations are as follows: "Certo che, no!" - Of course not!

"Stronza ficcanaso!" - Nosy bitch!

As always, leave me a review!